Kanye West Thinks Kim Kardashian Is the Marie Antoinette of Our Time

The rapper has been known to compare himself, and those around him, to some of history’s greatest artists and cultural figures. In 2016, he reportedly called himself “50 percent more influential” than Pablo Picasso, St. Paul the Apostle, Pablo Escobar, and filmmaker Stanley Kubrick, according to an audio clip Page Six obtained backstage at Saturday Night Live.

Now, the Life of Pablo star is comparing another celebrity to an infamous historical figure: wife Kim Kardashian. In an interview with The Hollywood Reporter, West speaks with designer Axel Vervoordt, the man who helped the famous couple design their home, about fashion, architecture, business, history, and the concept of time.

Specifically, they talked about philosophy, and West moved on to reveal he’s working on a book. “I’ve got this new concept that I’ve been diggin’ into. I’m writing a philosophy book right now called Break the Simulation. And I’ve got this philosophy—or let’s say it’s just a concept because sometimes philosophy sounds too heavy-handed,” he said.

“I've got a concept about photographs, and I'm on the fence about photographs—about human beings being obsessed with photographs—because it takes you out of the now and transports you into the past or transports you into the future. It can be used to document, but a lot of times it overtakes [people]. People dwell too much in the memories. People always wanna hear the history of something, which is important, but I think it there's too much of an importance put on history.”

His statement is fascinating considering he’s married to a woman with, at least from afar, an obsession with photography. Remember her selfie book? The conversation moved on to discuss why certain designers choose not to reference older pieces of clothing, and how he and Verwoordt are collaborating on a new home development in L.A.

Here’s the juicy part: “But it's interesting, as me and you are working on a new community [development in L.A.]—what do our homes look like now? Even with my wife, I see her as a representation, as a Marie Antoinette of our time. So with your mentality with spaces, I believe that what we've been working on will represent humanity for the next 500 to 1,000 years,” he said, later adding. “A designer told me that my wife was a master of light and I was a master of time.”

While discussing fashion, West also compared himself to the late physicist Stephen Hawking. "But when I talk to people in fashion they say 'Fashion is a dream, you're selling a dream, it's selling that aspiration.' I started to say things to people—now some of these things I could change my opinion two or three times on it depending on the feeling. I feel like Stephen Hawking. He changed his ideas and his theories all the time. After proving something right, he proved something wrong, right? Because there is no wrong or right, it's bipolarity, it is both sides," he said.

While we’re honestly not quite sure which qualities of Marie Antoinette—the Queen of France who infamously did not say “Let them eat cake!”—Kim may have, we now have several questions. The French royal was known for her lack of empathy toward the poor, along with her enormously over-the-top hairdos and the fact that indeed, she was convicted of treason and executed just before the French Revolution.

Maybe Kim’s planning on dolling out some huge wigs soon? We’re not so sure.

But he did make this comparison before in a 2016 interview with Harper's Bazaar. “My wife is the face of the change of fashion, where designers who literally wouldn’t let her sit in shows are now making entire collections based off of her shape," he said. "[She] represents our modern day Marie Antoinette. She gets hair and makeup every day, not just for a photo shoot. Why? Because every day is a photo shoot.”

New motto: every day is a photo shoot.

Show Transcript

[MUSIC] [BLANK_AUDIO]

[MUSIC] [BLANK_AUDIO]

You May Like

Read More

Let's Make It Newsletter-Official

Never have InStyle FOMO again! Get the best fashion, beauty, celebrity exclusives and shopping advice straight to your inbox.